Teens Form ‘Rape Club’ & Brag About Their Crimes Online

If you thought that the rape crimes such as the ones that happened in high schools in Steubenville, Ohio and Maryville, Missouriare isolated ones, think again. A group of high schoolers in New Zealand are under investigation for forming a club whose purpose was to rape underage drunk girls and boast about their crimes online. The members, who reportedly called themselves the "Roast Busters," would allegedly rape girls as young as 13 who were incapacitated by alcohol and then take to social media to brag of their crimes and slut shame the girls by name.

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The boys even reportedly had a Roast Busters Facebook page, dedicated to their so-called "conquests" -- where pics of their reign of rapes were posted. It has since been taken down.

One girl told a local New Zealand media outlet that she got drunk and kept passing out and then, "I got raped ... had sex with three guys at one time." This is not sex. It's assault.

Police have reportedly so far been unable to bring charges against any of the alleged perpetrators because the girls haven't come forward to press charges or give statements. Police say that social media brags -- and apparently there are plenty of them -- aren't enough.

I can think of several reasons why these girls may not want to step forward. Think about how the victims of the Steubenville and Maryville crimes were treated! Even their own female friends turned against them. No doubt these girls are scared to death. Some probably don't remember what happened either.

I've written before about coming close to being a victim of this sort of thing when I was in high school -- it was my first time ever drinking and I simply had no idea that a little shot could wreak such havoc on your body. So I quickly downed several of them, thinking nothing of it. Twenty minutes later, I could not move, and a boy at the party was on top of me. I somehow managed to get away and ran out of his house, into the woods, and eventually made my way to a phone and called my mother.

If I had been raped that day, it was not because I was a "slut" (in fact I was a virgin); or because I'd asked for it (I did not); or because I was an alcoholic (that was my first time drinking). But simply because I was ignorant of the effects of alcohol -- and the boys at the party had apparently never been taught that a girl who can't move can't give consent, and without consent, you are RAPING HER. And maybe they would not have cared if they HAD known this.

As for the Roast Busters, some of the teens even posted a YouTube video bragging about their crimes, and yet still police haven't intervened because they say they don't have enough evidence. (The teens refer to their rapes as "roasts.") "They know what we're like, they know what they're in for," one teen brags about the victims.

Hopefully some of these girls will find the courage to speak up against them. But if not, they should not be ashamed. A society that doesn't support these girls and instead gives the boys a free pass is the one that should be ashamed.

Do you worry about your teen daughter? What can be done to stop rape culture?